


If All Our Days Are Numbered Then Why Do I Keep Counting?

by labellelunaclaire



Category: Uncharted (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Break Up, F/M, Mid-Canon, Post-Among Thieves, Pre-Drake's Deception, alcohol use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-08
Updated: 2016-09-08
Packaged: 2018-08-13 23:12:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7989748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/labellelunaclaire/pseuds/labellelunaclaire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I think… I think we may have rushed into this.”</p><p>Nate and Elena's quickie marriage falls apart at the seams.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If All Our Days Are Numbered Then Why Do I Keep Counting?

Elena sighs. Runs a hand through her bangs. Refuses to look him in the eye. Her voice almost catches on the words as they fall from her lips. She’s thought these words so many times in the past eight months but hasn’t dared speak them out loud.

Until now.

“I think… I think we may have rushed into this.”

His world stops.

Nathan would not even really remember what they had been arguing about this night. It doesn’t really matter. Their arguments were really all the same. They all boiled down to one thing at the end of the day.

_I think we may have rushed into this._

He hasn’t breathed. He can’t breathe. He can only watch his life crash down around his feet, like when his mom died. Like when his brother died. Things Elena doesn’t know anything about.

_I think we may have rushed into this._

They have a marriage built on lies and deception. He knows this. He knows that she knows this. There are a million things in his past that he has not told her, does not plan on telling her. But in this moment he wants to tell her everything, dust off every skeleton in his closet, be honest with her, say everything he should have already said to keep her from leaving.

_I think we may have rushed into this._

He loves her. He loves her more than he’s ever loved anyone else.

It doesn’t matter now.

_I think we may have rushed into this._

Her words hang heavy in the air of their living room, pressing on his chest. He still can’t breathe. He doesn’t want to.

She finally looks up at him.

“Nathan.”

Her voice is soft and gentle. She’s been waiting for him to respond, to say something, but what can he say? She’s not wrong. They got married on the high of Shambhala, the high of her almost dying, not even two months after returning stateside.

“Please say something,” she pleads.

He forces air into his lungs at last. “I don’t know what you want me to say, Elena.” Because he doesn’t, and he’s being honest now, even though he doesn’t know where to begin.

There is an odd look in her eyes. He doesn’t know what it is. He’s feeling so many emotions himself that he can’t begin to identify what she’s feeling, too. “My boss… He suggested me for a foreign correspondent job. I haven’t given him an answer yet, but I think… I think I should take it.”

A punch in the gut would hurt less.

He would know.

“I think you should,” he hears himself say, but inside he’s screaming, _no, NO! You can’t just leave like that, I need you to stay, please say you’ll stay._

Elena’s face is incomprehensible. “Okay,” she says. “We’re both in agreement.”

“I guess we are.” _Stop being so stupid and tell her not to go!_

He thinks for a second that she has tears in her eyes, but it must be the light, because her face is carved from pure marble. “I have a call to make.”

And she walks out the door onto the balcony of their small apartment, already dialing whoever she needs to speak to about accepting the job that will take her away from him.

Nathan is frozen. He watches her for a second, seeing her pace in the orange glow of the balcony light. He can’t hear what she’s saying, but he can hear the sound of her voice.

Is this the last time he’ll hear it?

It’s time to stop this nonsense. It’s _over_. _They’re over_. She just made it very clear that she wants nothing to do with him, didn’t she? Time to pack up those feelings into a neat little box and shove it far away where he doesn’t have to think about them. Time to leave before she can leave.

Because if there’s one thing that all of his exes will tell you, it’s that leaving is a Nathan Drake specialty.

He springs into action. Quick. Unfeeling. Efficient. He is used to packing in minutes. He is always ready to run. Running is what he does. There is a duffle bag always in the corner of their closet. He grabs it. Rips all of his clothes off their hangers. Snatches his shoes from the pile on the floor. Cleans out his half of the dresser. His journals and papers are already in the bottom of the bag, where he keeps them between jobs. He is methodical. He has learned his entire life to only own what he can carry on his back in an emergency and eight months of playing house have not broken him of that mindset.

Time to go.

With the duffle slung over his shoulder he heads to the front door to grab the keys to his motorcycle and never look back. On the first place he ever had a legal lease. On the manufactured normalcy he’d tried so hard to fabricate. On Elena.

On his wife.

He allows himself one second to glance out the window to the balcony at the woman he loves with all of his heart. He’s afraid that if he takes any more time, he will lose his already fragile resolve to be the first to leave.

His hand is on the doorknob. He’s halfway out the door when Elena comes back inside and catches sight of him. He does not look at her. Does not speak to her. Does not acknowledge her in any way.

Even when she calls out his name.

He closes the door behind him and walks swiftly down the hall.

He hears the door fling back open.

“Nathan!” she yells after him.

He’s already going down the stairs.

God, he needs a drink.

 

* * *

 

She doesn’t chase after him. He doesn’t know what he would do if she did.

He jumps on his motorcycle and heads to the nearest hotel with a decent bar. He needs to get spectacularly drunk.

It’s a long time and many drinks later when he feels a hand on his shoulder.

For a second, he thinks it’s Elena, come to bring him home and tell him that she’s not taking the foreign correspondence job and that they’ll work it out.

But it’s just Sully.

Did he call Sully? He doesn’t remember. Maybe he did. He’s so far into a bottle of scotch he really has no way to be sure. But he must have, because Sully is here and sitting down next to him and motioning for the bartender to bring him a glass.

“Seems like you got yourself into a mess, kid,” Sully says, pouring himself some scotch from the bottle.

“She hates me, Sully,” he chokes out.

“I doubt she hates you, Nate. You just need to talk to her,” Sully responds diplomatically.

“She never wants to see me again, aren’t you listening?”

“Did she say that?”

He waves his hand around. “She didn’t have to! She’s _leaving_ , Sully. She’s leaving and it’s my fault.”

Sully sighs. “Let’s get you in bed, Nate. Sleep it off. You can talk to your wife tomorrow.”

Nathan allows himself to be lead away from the bar and to the elevator. He’s numb. He’s broken. He’s barely keeping it together.

Somehow Sully manages to get them into a room and deposits him on a bed and heads into the bathroom to fill a glass with water. Nate sprawls out, his head already pounding. He closes his eyes. They sting, and suddenly he’s sobbing.

His wedding band feels heavy on his ring finger. It weighs on his hand. Feels like lead. Feels like fire. Burns him. He’s upset. He’s angry. He’s every negative emotion amped up to eleven. He can’t take it, can’t take it, _can’t take it_.

He lets out a scream.

Sully is by his side. Pulls him into a sitting position. Presses a glass of cool water into his hand. His wedding band clinks against the glass.

Another reminder.

His head is now on Sully’s shoulder while he cries, hyperventilates, loses control of all reason in the world. Elena is the only reason in the world.

And he’s lost her.

“It’s going to turn out alright, Nate,” Sully promises, a gentle arm wrapped around his shoulders. “You’re going to work it out.”

“No. It’s not going to be alright. Nothing will ever be alright again.”

Sully grabs him by the arms and forces him to look up. The old man is in serious parent mode. “Kid, you have a damn good thing going for you. That girl _loves_ you and you’re acting like a fool.”

He’s too drunk for this. Too drunk. Why did he get so drunk? It’s not like it made him feel any better. He feels even worse. He knows Sully is right. But he can’t. He just _can’t_.

“I can’t, Sully,” he whispers. “I can’t face her. I can’t. I did this. This… this is my fault…”

And he’s sobbing once more.

The band on his finger is too much. All of this is too much. Over stimulating. Overwhelming. He needs it gone. All gone. Too much, too much, too much.

_Stop._

He screams again in frustration. Rips the ring from his finger. Throws it across the room. It’s over.

It’s over.

He clings to Sully like a child. Loses track of time. The sobbing subsides slowly. Eventually, Sully pries himself free from his grasp. Tugs the shoes from his feet. Somehow manages to get him under the blankets instead of on top of them.

“Get some sleep, Nathan.”

It doesn’t take long.

 

* * *

 

He wakes up with a splitting headache. He can’t remember the last time he was this hung over. If he’s ever been this hung over. His eyes burn.

He groans.

For one blissful second, he does not remember what happened that led to this sorry state.

“Good, you’re awake.”

The second passes.

Sully is standing over him when he opens his eyes, smoking a cigar, which has to be against the hotel rules. The previous night’s events flood back into his mind. The look on Elena’s face when she said they rushed into their marriage and the way he barely felt the clothes in his hands as he shoved them into his duffle and the sound of his wife’s voice calling his name while he walked away.

He will never forget that sound for as long as he lives.

Nathan sits up, rubbing his eyes. They feel swollen. He remembers crying, too. It seems unfair that even once you’re done crying your body won’t let you forget it. He wants to forget everything that happened.

Last night was a disaster. _He_ was a disaster. But today he has some much needed clarity. He’s back in control of his emotions. He is Nathan Drake once more, and Nathan Drake is a master at moving on from breakups.

“Have any work for me, Sully?” he asks, staring him straight in the eye.

Sully looks frustrated. “Kid, you agreed to get out of this life. I told you, just talk—”

“I need to get out of here—”

“It’s not the end!”

“It _is_ the end!”

“Alright, but even if it _i_ s the end, you’re _married_. It takes a whole lot more to end a marriage than just walking out. Trust me, divorce is quite the process.”

“I can’t think about that right now, Sully.”

“Stop acting like a child, Nate, and talk to your damn wife.”

“I _can’t_ , Sully,” he says desperately, those painful emotions coming back. He closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose. God, his head hurts like a bitch. “I just… can’t face her right now.”

Sully sighs. There’s a long pause. “I’ll make some calls. See what I can drum up for you,” he resigns.

He gets the feeling that this conversation isn’t over.

He’ll cross that bridge later. For now, he starts falling into old habits. He’s missed the thrill of it all. Soon he’ll be back doing what he does best, what he loves.

It just won’t be with _who_ he loves.

**Author's Note:**

> I just beat Uncharted 4 after watching the first three games on youtube (I'm getting to play them now), and I fell in love with Nate and Elena and the development of their relationship, including their marriage and subsequent separation between the second and third games.
> 
> I was experimenting a bit with the writing style. I don't usually write in the very short, clipped sentences, but I felt like it really worked for this fic. Also, despite having been drunk many times in my life, writing drunk people is hard.
> 
> The title comes from a song by The Killers called "Why Do I Keep Counting?"


End file.
